Day 009/365: Guided Meditation | Ajahn Brahm

Meditation is learning how to just simply relax the mind.

And sometimes people misunderstand what meditation is.

They're trying very hard,

They're trying to do something,

Get rid of things.

And that very trying is the opposite of relaxation.

In the same way that if you're trying to relax your body,

You can't be doing things with the body.

You can't be running around,

Even walking does not relax the body.

You need to do something a bit more passive to relax the body.

And the same thing with the mind.

So when I'm going to be teaching this meditation today,

Emphasizing on how to relax the body and using exactly precisely the same methods to relax your mind.

And that is Buddhist meditation.

So it's not about concentration.

That is a very unfortunate translation or rather mistranslation of the Buddhist word for samadhi.

It is about stillness,

Relaxation,

Peace,

Stillness.

Those are the words which describe what meditation is all about.

So first of all,

You just sit comfortably.

You don't need to sit on the floor.

You don't get extra points for sitting on the floor.

We want to make sure everyone sits comfortably.

On a chair is more than fine.

Or if you have your own little stool somewhere,

You can bring that.

We have these Zen stools,

Which you can see on the back over here.

Just a little.

Do you want to hold that up,

Chris?

So you see those stools?

They're really comfortable for people to sit on.

You can make them yourself.

I think there's a few on sale in our library.

And they're very,

Very comfortable to sit on.

So you're doing this because it's going to relax you,

Relax your body.

And if you're sitting and going through pain,

All you ever get is more frustration.

If you want to experience pain,

Then go to countries like Syria or Iraq and they will teach you all about pain and torture.

And that's not what Buddhism is about at all.

So we learn how to relax our body,

Sitting comfortably,

First of all,

Whatever position is comfortable for you.

And now to be able to take that relaxation deeper,

We do need to be very aware of our body.

Simple mindfulness.

Now that awareness of your body is just very superficial at first.

You have to keep your awareness on your body until the awareness gets strong enough,

You can actually start to perceive tensions and tight spots in your body.

And awareness is not enough by itself.

We have to add this other wonderful quality,

Which is usual,

Common,

So well understood in Buddhism,

But often not practiced in meditation,

Just compassion,

Kindness,

Softness.

Which means that when you see a part of the body which is tense,

You learn how to relax it.

The mindfulness gives you feedback.

It's like looking at the gauge,

Your speed gauge in your car.

You can see when that speed gauge changes whether you're accelerating or you're slowing down.

And it gives you feedback.

And so this gauge in the body,

You can see through mindfulness if your body is tense or getting more relaxed.

And that mindfulness giving you feedback is how you learn to relax your body more and more and more until your body gets really relaxed.

Now once it gets really relaxed,

You don't stop there.

You actually start to notice what I call the delight in relaxation.

Now you may think this is just an interesting technique,

But this actually becomes very powerful later on in the meditation to be able to recognize the happiness,

The delight,

The sheer joy of some of these states of relaxation.

You all know that such a delight exists because people spend thousands of dollars going to Bali to sit on a chair next to the ocean and get relaxed.

But you don't need to spend all that money and go through all the airports and have your flight delayed and lose your baggage and all the other stuff which happens when you go traveling.

You can do it here every Saturday afternoon and save yourself a lot of trouble to relax deeper than if you were by the beach with nothing to do.

So how that happens,

The reason why people pay a lot of money for those holidays,

There is a delight,

There is a happiness in physical relaxation.

It feels good.

This is what I want you to start perceiving,

Noticing when your body relaxes.

It feels really nice.

And if you notice a delight in that relaxation,

Strange thing happens,

The relaxation goes deeper.

Somehow or other when you see something delightful,

The mind automatically wants more and you don't take the relaxation deeper,

Your mind takes it deeper for you.

Simply because it notices delight,

Automatically it wants more of that and it goes more and more relaxed.

So you do that with your body,

Relaxing to the max until your body feels so delightful.

Once the body has relaxed and feels delightful and you've enjoyed yourself,

It doesn't matter how long that takes,

It really depends upon you,

On the situation,

The time of the day,

The time of the month,

The time of the year.

So don't give things such fixed rules,

You have to adapt.

That's what mindfulness does,

Gives you the feedback,

See how much you can get relaxed.

When you get the delight of relaxation,

You can't relax any further,

Fine,

Now is the time to let go of the body and start doing the same thing,

Exactly the same thing to your mind.

Now I like this technique because most people,

They have some idea of relaxing their body,

They have no idea how to relax their mind,

Which means that if you just start meditating and try to do this and do that,

Watch your breath,

You can't do it,

You're too tense and it becomes a struggle,

You get fed up and frustrated and there's hardly any benefits at all.

You know,

You go away,

It's just crazy that you came in here.

But if you can learn how to relax the body first of all,

Then you'll find you can apply those exact same techniques to relax your mental world.

So once the body feels good,

Then you look at your mental world and it's full of all these problems from the past,

All these worries about the future,

All these things which are like aches and pains,

But now not in the body,

They're aches and pains in your mental world.

And in exactly the same way,

You relax your body,

In exactly that way,

You relax the mind.

So it may have something in the past,

Some of which happened to you this morning,

You can't really get rid of.

Number one,

You can't take an ache in the body and say,

Get out of here,

You know,

You have to deal with it,

Heal it,

Look after it,

Tend it,

Care for it,

And then the aches and pains in the body disappear.

In the same way,

Use mindfulness and some kindness to relax the body,

You do exactly the same,

Awareness and kindness to relax your mental world.

For example,

Somebody said something really nasty to you this morning.

You can't just say,

Get rid of it,

Get out of here,

You be aware of it and be kind to it.

And you find that that awareness and kindness,

Just like it relaxes the body,

Takes away the pressure and the tensions in your body,

It takes away the pressure of the past.

The past doesn't seem to be dragging you back with attention.

When you're kind to something,

You find it softens.

I call this softening the past.

Aware of it,

Kind to it,

Allowing it to be.

And it gets just like an ache in the body,

It gets less tight,

More loose,

More loose,

Until it gets so loose,

It just vanishes away.

That's how you deal with the past.

And the same may be maybe worried about the future.

Maybe the results of your biopsy are coming out on Monday,

Or kids are doing their year 12 exams,

Or whatever it is you're really afraid of.

You can't just say,

I'm not going to pay any attention to that thing in the future.

You can't do this by force.

Be aware and be kind.

Be kind to your future.

Soften it,

Rather than fighting it.

Then you find even the future gets so soft that it too just vanishes away.

You are literally relaxing your mental world.

So the aches and the pains of the body,

The past and the future and the mind,

They just disappear.

And you have this whole attitude of not doing something.

That's what you,

The opposite of relaxation.

It's just letting things be.

As they save,

People go to parties to get away from it all.

What do you do when you meditate?

You don't get away from anything.

All those thoughts and memories,

They keep flooding in,

Even more than ever.

You're not getting away from it,

You're just really getting into it.

So to get away from it,

Get away from the past,

Away from the future by relaxing.

Now when you do get into the present moment,

This place called now,

Again,

Relax with the now.

As I say,

Be a friend to this present moment.

Don't be an owner,

Don't be a controller,

Don't be a boss.

People are really good.

They're not bosses most of the time.

But when it gets to their family,

Maybe then they're the boss.

When it gets to their body,

They're certainly the boss.

When it gets to the mind,

They're the control freak,

You know,

The dictator.

So don't be a dictator to your mind.

Otherwise you'll abuse it.

Be a friend.

Have a like a relationship to your mental world of friendliness.

It's your old mind,

You've spent a lot of time together,

But you spent all your life together.

If you're a Buddhist,

You spent many lives together with their old mind.

It's about time you got a good relationship with it,

Because you can divorce your wife,

You can get rid of your body with euthanasia,

But you can't get rid of your mind any which way at all.

So you're stuck with it.

So you better learn how to love it.

And be kind to it,

Because you can't escape.

So learn how to be kind to your mind,

Especially in this present moment.

And it's all but that beautiful kindness,

Not trying to control it,

Not trying to cure it of all its miseries and bad habits,

But caring for it.

And just with that amount of caring,

You'll find all the restlessness,

The reason why you go thinking about so many things,

Is taken away.

Many years ago,

When I was teaching meditation,

It wasn't trying to stop my restlessness,

My wandering mind,

It was asking,

Why does your mind wander in the first place?

What's the cause of a mind wandering away?

And I noticed when people were listening to my talks,

If I gave a really boring talk,

A really awful talk,

Then people wander away.

If I was kind to people,

Then people would stay with me.

It became very obvious.

Do you like hanging out with people who are kind?

My mind likes hanging out with me when I am kind and caring and not so critical and judgmental.

So I developed when I'm watching my mind,

Not to be judgmental,

Not to be critical,

Not to be a control freak,

But I look upon my mind as my dear old friend.

So we hang out together.

Your best friends,

The people you like spending time with,

Do they criticize you and give you a hard time and tell you all the things which you're doing wrong?

You're not eating the right foods,

You're not sort of resting,

You're not doing this,

You should brush your teeth,

Clean behind your ears,

Wear clean underpants when you come to the Buddhist center just in case,

Whatever it is.

If people keep on going on like that,

You don't want them as friends,

Always telling you what to do.

And of course,

Your mind will never stay with you.

You never have any peace if you treat your own mind like that.

So treat your mind with some respect,

With some kindness,

With some care.

Mindfulness and kindness.

You find then your mind settles down.

As your mind settles down in this present moment,

Because it's not doing very much,

In fact it's hardly doing anything at all,

That means your mindfulness starts to get stronger and stronger,

Which is one of the other important parts of meditation,

To increase the power of your mindfulness.

What that really means,

It's like when you first get up in the morning and you haven't got the light on,

You can hardly see what's in your room,

But as I put the lights on,

You can see much more,

You can feel much more,

You can taste much more when your mindfulness starts to get strong.

Literally you are waking up.

That's what the word the Buddha means.

It is the awakened one from the word pucchati,

To wake up.

So your mindfulness gets stronger and stronger and stronger through stillness.

And then you start to really enjoy the meditation,

You see so much more in your mind.

And the other thing with mindfulness increasing,

The stronger it gets.

There is a free gift,

Like you get the free gift in the cornflakes packet.

You get the free gift when you go traveling a lot,

You get these frequent fly points so you can upgrade.

If you meditate a lot,

The mindfulness gets upgraded and the free gift is happiness.

Weird.

And to let you know how your mind works,

The stronger your mindfulness,

The happier you feel,

Really happy.

And as you remain still in the present moment a long time,

Wow,

Your happiness gets off the scale.

So that is what will happen if you follow the instructions of just being mindful and being kind.

The same way you relax the body,

You relax the mind and you bliss out of your skull.

Oh,

What fun.

So,

That's the marketing.

Now we actually buy the product.

So sitting down we can now do some meditation.

I will guide you for the first 10 minutes or so and then I will let you go off on your journey into the bliss and peace of relaxation.

Here we go.

So closing your eyes.

Deciding not to fight.

We're not going to fight the world now.

We're going to relax with the world.

Not fighting our body but learning how to be at peace with our body.

First of all,

You may not be sitting in the best position.

So if you want to adjust your body,

Wiggle your bottom,

Adjust the legs,

Have a scratch,

Have a nose blow,

Whatever you want to do,

Please do it now out of respect for your bodily peace.

You can move right throughout the whole meditation if you need to,

But especially the first couple of minutes to relax your body through movement,

Through adjusting,

Scratching,

Whatever,

Coughing,

Whatever you want to do.

And once that course relaxation of the body through bodily movement is complete,

Now relax the body even further.

If there's any tightness or tension anywhere in the body,

Any pain,

Any irritation,

Be fully aware of it and don't try and get rid of that pain,

That ache,

That irritation.

Trying to get rid of it would make it worse.

Like a barking dog,

If you try and chase it away,

It will come and bite you.

Instead be aware and notice that mindfulness gives you feedback and you can notice how sensations in your body change.

They're not always the same amount of pain or irritation.

They lessen,

Sometimes they get more.

Find out why they get relaxed.

What attitude of your mind when sent to your body makes the tensions be relieved,

Makes the aches a little less painful?

What opens up blockages?

What is that?

By watching the dial of mindfulness,

You'll find that it's kindness,

Beautiful love,

Acceptance,

Caring,

Which relaxes your body deeper and deeper.

Just like a mother comforting her child when it's sick,

Takes away the pain.

Where little act of kindness you see through the day,

Takes away the pain of life when you see how beautiful it can be.

Stay with your body,

Whatever part is irritating.

Focus,

Use mindfulness and kindness.

Feel the body open out and relax.

Like you are on some beach at a resort.

Nothing to do,

Nothing to get rid of.

Just being here with your body.

Relaxing to the max.

Relaxing to the max.

Relaxing to the max.

Relaxing to the max.

Relaxing to the max.

Feel the body relaxing even more until it feels delightful.

See if you can be aware of the delights of relaxation.

If you can notice the delights of relaxation,

The relaxation goes even deeper,

All by itself.

Relaxing to the max.

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It is getting very close to the end of the meditation.

How relaxed are you?

How are you in your mind?

And how delightful is this feeling?

Having nothing to do,

Nowhere to go.

Just being in this moment,

Aware and kind.

Relaxing to the max.

Relaxing to the max.

Relaxing to the max.

Relaxing to the max.

And now I'm going to ring the gong three times to finish the meditation.

Please don't open your eyes until the last ringing of the gong fades away.

So you always come out of meditation gradually and gently.

And the third ringing of the gong.

There we go.

So we do have obviously much more to meditation than just this wonderful piece of instruction.

I've been teaching this for years and going around the world teaching this.

And when people start to relax their minds,

They realize how easy meditation is.

For those of you who've heard about other types of meditation like watching the breath,

The breath comes to you eventually.

You just relax and become so peaceful that's the only thing left which is moving and you just observe the breath.

And your mind gets so peaceful.

And if you do get sleepy during the meditation,

It's just because you have to,

Because you are tired.

And it's just a sign of all the running around we do in our world.

And given the chance,

The brain will just turn off for a while.

If you fight,

You just get more tense.

If you let go,

Soon the sleepiness vanishes.

When it does,

You're so peaceful and having a wonderful time.

Are there any questions from overseas?

No,

Okay,

Very good.

So questions from the floor,

Yeah.

Here we go,

Here we go,

Boom,

Boom,

Boom.

Yeah.

Start working.

Hello.

Say you want to achieve something like enlightenment.

Where does the balance lie between intention and surrender?

Okay,

Remember,

Nirvana enlightenment is just very deep stages of letting go,

Being so content.

You don't need anything anymore.

It's a good sign that if you are fully enlightened and you found a little bottle and you rubbed it and the beanie came out and said,

So according to our tradition which still holds in 2014 in Perth,

Australia,

You now have three wishes,

What would you want?

And if you're enlightened,

You say,

Nothing.

That's actually a sign,

Nothing you want,

Perfectly at peace and content.

That's a sign,

So you can understand peaceful contentment,

The ending of things like craving and wanting.

How on earth can that be achieved by wanting something?

So we learn how to be so still.

Then we realize that everything we ever wanted,

All the things we intended for,

All the things we struggled and strived for,

We have those already.

We don't notice it because we're just struggling and wanting,

All sorts of other stuff.

So this is where even enlightenment is a very powerful,

Very deep stage of letting go,

Not of control.

So you can't work your way to enlightenment,

You can't struggle.

All those techniques which you learn in the world which give you success in life,

Don't work on this path.

It's a totally different path.

But to find that balance in the world,

You find once you're really relaxed and at peace for,

You find your brain because it's relaxed now has energy.

Mindfulness is really strong after deep meditation,

So you have creativity as well.

You literally can see things which you can't see otherwise.

So with that creativity,

With that energy,

It's amazing how successful you can be in life.

I often say to people that as far as monks go,

I'm a very successful monk,

You know,

For the monk business.

So how can you be so successful?

How can you work so much?

I was going to say work hard.

But I don't work hard,

I work soft,

Not hard.

Just give it slightly different meaning.

Don't work hard,

Work soft.

And you get much more done,

Of higher quality.

So all the things you work hard for,

Struggling,

Striving,

Pushing yourself,

Because you want to get the work done.

You find you stuff up your mind,

You stuff up your relationships,

Stuff up your health.

You don't get anything done anyway.

You work softly,

Carefully,

Mindfully,

Kindly.

It's amazing how much you get done in the world.

So the nice thing about this,

It's not an either or.

If I get enlightened and then I can't work,

I can't do my job.

If I meditate,

I just sort of bliss out and I won't get anything done at home or in my office.

Quite the opposite.

You get more done,

The more peaceful you are.

Paradoxical,

But that's true.

That make sense to you?

Thank you.

Okay,

Chris.

Can I ask you a technical question?

Yeah,

Sure.

Okay.

When you've been sitting and you've got reasonably good focus,

I won't use the word concentration because I know how you feel about that word.

Concentration?

Oh no.

And you're established.

And this question is with respect to the Satipatthana Sutra and the Buddha's instructions for meditation on the breath.

So that the first quadrat is on the body,

The second is on feelings,

The third is on perceptions and mind objects,

And the fourth is on consciousness.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

Okay.

Can I correct you?

No.

Please.

Okay,

Carry on first.

The second quadrat is on Vedana.

Vedana,

That's what I mean.

It's pressure and pain.

So actually it's a really important point in the Anapanasati Sutra of the Buddha.

You're only watching the breath,

The breath-breath,

From the very beginning.

And then you're getting the feeling,

The joy.

What I pointed out at the beginning,

Focusing on the delight of just being relaxed and peaceful.

And the next part is focusing on not perceptions,

On the jitta,

This thing we call mind.

That was my question.

My question is the third tetrad,

And actually samadhi without an object,

Without an acquired sign,

And doing that practice.

So you've got good concentration,

It's gone from physical breath to mental breath,

Mental breath to delight,

And now you're just sitting watching the mind in the third tetrad.

Can you explain a little bit about that practice?

What is the goal of that and where does it lead to,

Please?

Okay.

So when you're watching the delight of the,

Basically of the breath and relaxation,

The body vanishes.

And you're in the sixth sense.

And sometimes we live in a Western world which has totally abandoned the idea of a consciousness,

A mind,

The sixth sense.

And quite frankly I've spent a lot of time going overseas in McGill University,

Supposed to be giving a lecture or seminar for the day on consciousness and the mind,

You know,

From science and from meditators.

It turned into something else which was a bit gross,

But I spend a lot of time trying to really say this mind,

This jitta is something totally independent of the body.

And once you understand that framework,

It makes so much sense.

You're going to calm this body down,

Keep it still till it disappears.

So the first eight parts of the Anupama Sati Sutta,

We're learning how to let go of this body and the five senses.

The first eight?

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

Okay,

It's a mental breath,

That's good,

But how you perceive the mental breath is through the joy of it,

Through the happiness of it.

It's like seeing Chris and noticing how happy you are rather than just how,

I was going to say something,

You watch Ajahn Brahm,

Instead of watching how fatty he is,

How happy he is,

You know,

Just so your perception is of the joy and the happiness part and then it becomes just that disappears with the body and the breath disappears and then you've just got this jitta,

This mind.

Can you say something about that please?

Yeah,

How it usually occurs for most people is they see a light in their mind.

A light.

Yeah,

Okay.

Were you talking about nimittas?

Nimittas,

Yeah,

Exactly.

Is there a way to do samadhi without a sign,

Not with a sign?

Of course,

There is.

There is a way of bypassing that sign,

But it's about the nimitta,

The light which comes up in your mind.

But it's not really that helpful because when you have like a light in the mind,

You have something which is a little bit more tangible to work with and the reason why the nimittas,

These lights,

Don't come up is because we don't develop enough delight and the delight is like a sign of the power of your mindfulness.

The more delight,

The stronger your awareness is.

So sometimes when a person,

Their body vanishes in meditation,

Really mad vanishes,

There's lots of meditators,

This is,

You know,

I teach a lot,

They report to me,

They just go into this dark place,

It's peaceful,

But there's no sort of oompf in it and it's because as Westerners in our world,

We're afraid of happiness.

And as a psychologist,

You know this,

Sometimes when happiness comes,

We want to destroy it,

There must be something wrong.

I'm not allowed to be happy because I've been a bad boy when I was a kid and your mum said you're never good enough.

Whatever it was,

There is a huge amount of resistance to being happy and that really comes up when you meditate,

Which means that you don't cultivate enough delight and the mind is just kept down,

It's subdued rather than allowing to fly into this incredible powerful mindfulness and happiness.

It can also be scary as well because you've got power and people don't know how to use power,

They get afraid of it.

So you have to keep relaxing yourself as your charge increases,

As you go deeper and deeper into that experience.

Yeah,

And mindfulness shows you that if you want to have stronger mindfulness,

You have to let go more,

Be more still and it's just a natural process.

The more still you are,

The stronger your mindfulness,

The stronger your mindfulness,

The happier you are.

And it's just like the lights come up in your mind.

What you can see is during the range retreat,

This one lady,

My simile of watching the toilet bowl and seeing the most beautiful lump of shit in the whole world I've ever noticed.

It's an absolutely true story,

But one of the ladies during the range retreat,

She was actually sitting on the toilet and looking at the tile and she saw the tile became just not a fancy bathroom tile,

Just a plain white tile because we do it on the cheap.

And the tiles actually came from a fire cell,

Literally.

A warehouse was on fire and somebody brought those tiles and they literally were that and so it's an ordinary tile.

And she was looking at that because she was meditating beforehand,

Sitting on the tile and the tile became absolutely gorgeous,

Amazingly beautiful.

Now that is very common in meditation.

That's a sign that your mindfulness is really strong.

What you see,

Many people have these smells,

They can smell fragrances everywhere,

Just because your sense of smell has just got really beautiful.

And you feel,

If you feel the body just stroke,

It's incredibly soft.

That you're,

Basically that's a sign that your mindfulness is getting very strong.

Five senses that vanish and that mindfulness that sees this mind is gorgeous.

Once you have that gorgeousness,

That happiness there,

Then it's nearly always you see the beautiful light.

If you're peaceful,

You haven't developed the happiness part and the five senses have vanished,

Then you don't really get the strong limiters.

It seems to me that that is a crossroads in the,

Where long term or medium term meditators who are going deeper and deeper into the mind can get to the crossroads and they can take a very wrong turn and park themselves in a place of sloth and torpor of laxity and spend years meditating there,

Think that they're meditating and meditating for many hours and actually just being like a Thai water buffalo and having this sort of peaceful cruisy space instead of this brilliance or this luminosity that you speak about.

Indeed,

And one of the reasons is again because,

And I say this is technical but it's an important part because this keeps coming up even recently I think.

It was just on Wednesday night in London,

Somebody asked me,

He said,

But you get attached to that happiness.

And I have an idea in Buddhism,

We're not supposed to be attached to anything,

Everything we have to be attached to.

And I counter with just the first little say,

If you're on the back of a motorbike in London,

Please be attached,

Don't fall off.

And I say that because obviously in life there are many things we have to be attached to.

And when it gets to the bliss of these meditations,

I quote now the Buddha,

This is Pasadikasutra,

You've heard me say this before,

This is recorded.

So if you look at the Pasadikasutra,

The Digha Nikāra,

That's the place where the Buddha answers that question precisely.

What happens if you really start to indulge in the bliss of these meditations?

And that's where the Buddha says specifically,

Only four possibilities,

First,

Second,

Third,

Fourth stage of enlightenment.

That's what happens if you get attached to the bliss of the jhanas.

In other words,

We're supposed to do this.

This is what we're supposed to do.

Remember some Thai forest monk,

I forget who he was,

He said,

Being attached to the jhanas,

That's not a problem,

It's attached to all the other stuff which is a problem.

Attached to the jhanas,

The bliss of meditation,

That's not a problem at all.

That leads to being enlightened.

So that's when these nimittas come up and they're really powerful.

Oh,

Just get into them,

Go for them.

And that's when those stages of meditation in the,

I say,

9th,

10th,

11th,

12th,

Is you've got to sort of stabilize that beautiful light,

Empower it.

Spread it?

First of all,

You experience it,

That's number 9.

Then samadha hung is like,

That's actually the 10th,

Sampa sadhanam,

That means just bring it more joy.

I call it,

You know,

Polishing it,

Brightening it,

Making the light more radiant,

More intense.

And then the samadha hung,

The 11th stage,

The 11th stage is you keep it still so it's not going around the place.

Focus perfectly still,

Incredibly bright.

And the 12th one is when you enter the jhanas.

Is there any other way in that stage?

There's other ways of going into the jhanas,

But that is actually just going through the bliss.

In other words,

It's bypassing the nimitta stage through a feeling of great bliss and peace.

Does it always have to be consolidated through a nimitta into jhana or do you just get actually that luminosity in that stage?

Luminosity is fine,

But you have to really sort of get a lot of energy up.

Thank you.

High energy,

Beautiful letting go.

Because the more you let go,

The less you do,

The more mindfulness gets a big boost.

Thank you.

Yeah,

Sure.

Can you pass the microphone over?

For those of you who need to go,

Please,

You cannot offend a monk so you can go anytime,

Especially if you need to go to the toilet and do some other letting go.

I think you just answered it,

But how long should you,

If you've got the time or whatever,

There's no danger in just going deeper and deeper into your meditation,

If you find it,

I don't know if it's endorphins or whatever,

If it's going good.

If it's going good,

Carry on.

Yeah,

It's like in one sitting,

If you want to do it for half the night or something or something like that,

There's no… There's no time limit.

It's only here because we advertise 45 minutes,

So I try and keep that.

But when I teach a retreat,

I like telling jokes,

But the jokes are there for a purpose.

We keep no bell silence,

No bells.

I hate ringing this gong because sometimes I'm having a good time and I have to come out for you and ring this blooming gong.

I don't want to,

I'm enjoying myself.

A few times that's been very difficult for me,

Sitting up here,

Ringing this gong at 4 o'clock.

If I had the choice,

If you weren't here,

I'd be still meditating here.

So keep it natural.

There are times when 10 minutes is enough.

You realize you're getting nowhere,

You're just pushing yourself against a wall.

It's not going to work.

Other times,

Half an hour is just the right time.

Sometimes a couple of hours,

You're having a great time.

So if you're having a good time,

Please carry on.

I just thought,

You know,

Because it sounds a bit weird,

Sort of like… Yeah,

No,

It's not weird at all,

It's natural.

…treating it all through for half the night or something.

Sometimes even as a monk,

Meditate for many years.

There are some times when I'm just really hot,

Meditation hot,

Not full of heat hot.

You really get into it,

You're just really going and you don't want to come out.

And other times,

Maybe you're tired or you're sick or there's something wrong.

And after half an hour now,

You realize this is enough.

And after many years of meditating,

You know that.

You know whether you're just wasting time carrying on or whether you're carrying on,

Wow,

This is going to really work this time.

And so I think like if you sit down at a certain time each day,

It's okay,

Like… That's okay as well but… …sometimes you go through a bad patch and then you don't do it for a few days and then it's harder to get back into it.

Well,

If you keep meditating a certain time and you force yourself,

Then you'll start giving it up.

So it's better like to do it when you feel like it.

Exactly.

And I say that simply because if you force yourself like anything else,

The mind gets resentment and anger like you force a kid.

Yeah.

You don't use force but sometimes you can use a bit of rewards,

A bit of temptation,

I give myself a chocolate cake if I meditate or whatever.

Whatever it is,

Sometimes don't use the punishment part of it because that really turns the mind away from meditation.

Use the kindness.

Because I find that I go through a good patch and then like maybe a week and a half or something,

Then it's like,

Oh,

I don't know what's going on,

But it's not that it's harder.

Well,

It's just… You know,

It's hard,

You know.

The main thing is when you really start to delight in the meditation,

It's such a beautiful thing to do.

Then you always schedule it in above other things.

You may have your favorite movie,

Maybe some soap opera or some cricket match or something people like watching.

And when it's… you're doing something you really want to watch and enjoy,

You know,

You always… the mind wants to do it.

Yeah,

Because I didn't know if it was like a training of the mind or if it's more like,

You know,

Do it when you want to.

Yeah,

It's what happens to the mind.

You don't do it,

You don't train,

But as you enjoy the meditation more and more,

You get more happiness out of it.

You look forward to it.

And it's just like taking the dog out for a walk.

Yeah.

As soon as the dog sees you touch the leash,

Wags its tail,

Woof woof,

I want to go.

Yeah.

And that's like my mind when I meditate.

I sit down and I say,

Yeah,

You didn't take me for meditation.

Woof woof woof.

And my tail wags,

Wags,

Wags because I've had such a lovely time meditating before.

But if I'd forced the dog to go for a walk when it doesn't want to,

Then the dog won't do that anymore.

It gets sort of… Okay,

There's another one more question over here.

Here we keep going.

Yeah,

Here we go.

Recently a friend was brought up to me,

There's this book written by Ajahn Sumedho on the sound of silence.

Ah yes,

Yeah.

And when he was talking about this,

And suddenly now I got this,

Noticed that sound,

I picked it up,

And it's just only recently.

And it's been all like a constant thing,

And how do we address it?

How do we meditate?

If you look into the Hindu meditation,

They have that as a Hindu technique of meditation,

But it's never really been used in Buddhist meditation.

And there's a good reason for that,

It's because we're trying to let go of all sound.

And you find that you can start that,

You focus in the sense of everything else can disappear,

But you're still left with the sound.

So you can't take it deeper.

So it can go only so far,

Which is why it's great to be able to let go of all sounds as soon as possible.

I remember one of the monks,

Who was actually a Menindo,

He had a good opportunity of meeting the great Mahasi Sayadaw,

Taking him for a walk in the forest in England many years ago,

This is the original Mahasi Sayadaw.

And he asked him,

What do you think about the sound of silence?

And Mahasi sort of said,

If it's meditation,

There's no sound at all.

So,

I mean,

We,

It is like,

We didn't want to pay notice,

I don't want to pay notice,

Whatever,

It's been there,

You know it's there all the time,

And how do we?

Well,

That's the thing,

You can feel the humming of the air,

Or whatever it is,

But it's not there all the time,

In the sense of your saliva,

The taste of saliva,

Your mouth is there all the time,

But it becomes a hindrance,

You need to sort of let it vanish and disappear.

When things vanish and disappear,

Then you're free of them.

So that is why the breath is better than the sounds,

Even what they call,

Sound of silence,

You know,

It's an oxymoron.

If it's silent,

You don't hear anything,

If there's a sound,

It's completely different,

It's not the sound of silence,

Silence is no sound at all.

So it's a sound,

And it's useful for people,

Because it stops them thinking,

It gives them something they can focus on,

And it can actually get rid of a lot of problems,

But it can only go so far.

In other words,

It's,

Soon you get to a dead end,

You can't go further.

But something like the breath,

The breath actually changes,

As you get more and more calm and peaceful,

Because you know,

You're being still,

You don't need so much oxygen for your body,

The breath starts to get less and less,

It's just its nature.

And it gets so soft,

And so almost hardly not there,

It can actually vanish.

And the sound of silence can't do that.

That's why the breath meditation was taught by the Buddha.

Thank you.

Okay.

Okay,

There we go,

Some really good questions today,

So thank you for going to ask the questions,

And thank you for staying on to listen to them.

So now we can actually do our prostration to the Buddha,

And then if you've got any more questions,

Please,

I'll be up here for a while.

And again,

For those of you who've just come starting off meditation,

Many of these people here have been meditating for years,

People have come just for six months,

So we have all sorts of questions,

And everyone,

The basics to the refined are all welcome,

All respected.